Changing life's timeline, one pattern at a time

[WhiteHawk]

With the rediscovery of Lifeline Volume 12, I thought it might be interesting to pose a little thought experiment/game.

The premise: you are in the present day (right here, right now), and have in your possession a time fax with which you can send any life pattern to the early days of Life's discovery phase (Either from 1970 to 1974 or from 1986 to 1996 before the discover), where it will be received by any early life enthusiast of choice. However, the energy requirements of the past fax mean that you may only send back one pattern which fits in a max 200 by 200 cell bounding box (no fitting multiple patterns, no worded messages using CGOL letter) before the machine's circuits fry and the device is destroyed. What pattern will you choose to send back to form an alternate timeline and to who/when?

If you want, say why your choice of item or envision the series of events that occur after the pattern in the alternate timeline.

[PiSpaceships]

p15 glider gun to 1970:

Code: Select all

x = 38, y = 34, rule = B3/S23
2$21b2o$11bo8bobo$10bobo2b3obobo$11bo3bobob2o$17b3o$13b2o6b3o$b2o10b3o
bo$2bo11b3obo$2bobo11b2o$3b2o5b2o2$10bobo$9b4o2b2o$3b2o4b2o2b4o$2bobo
8bobo$2bo$b2o11b2o$8b2o$7bob3o15b3o$8bob3o7b3o3bo3bo$2b3o6b2o7b3o2bo5b
o$6b3o$5b2obobo3bo5bobobo7bo$4bobob3o2bobo4bobobo7bo$3bobo8bo$3b2o15b
3o2bo5bo$20b3o3bo3bo$27b3o!

Edit: To Conway before he discovered a glider.

[LuveelVoom]

Tetrational diehard ( https://conwaylife.com/wiki/Engineered_diehard) to anywhere before around 1990, or maybe quartermax?

[b-engine]

I would send this "oscillator G stabilization" to January 1973:

Stabilization of "oscillator" G shown in Lifeline_Volume_8#Page_1:
…

EDIT: Using 5blink for further reduction. I'm still finding smaller sparkers:

Code: Select all

x = 18, y = 17, rule = B3/S23
4b2o$4b2o$9b2o$4b4o2bo$2obo4b2o$bobobobo$o2bo3bo$3o3bo$3b3o4b2o$2bo5b
3obo$2b2o3b3obo$7b2o6b3o$11b3o$5bo3bobob2o$4bobo2b3obobo$5bo8bobo$15b
2o!

EDIT: I had seriously forgot the existence of technician??? Wait, that pattern includes 5blink.